


Supernova

by IllusiveWritings



Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, DC Extended Universe, Justice League (2017), Wonder Woman (Movies - Jenkins), Wonder Woman - All Media Types
Genre: Album: Resist (Within Temptation), Angst, Angst and Feels, Diana (Wonder Woman) Needs a Hug, F/M, Feels, Flash is adorable, Flash is the best friend we all want, Inspired by Within Temptation, Literally running, Running, Song: Supernova (Within Temptation), Ultrarunning, Ultrarunning is absurd but I want to run an ultra so badly, Western States Endurance Run, Wonder Woman Runs Marathons, Wonder Woman has a hobby, running away from problems
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-17
Updated: 2020-02-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:55:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22775269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IllusiveWritings/pseuds/IllusiveWritings
Summary: Set in the DC movie verse. Won't take WW84 spoilers and leaks in consideration because nothing is official until the movie is released.While living in Man's World Diana found a hobby: running. And when marathons turned out to be a breeze, she set her eyes to the extremes, ultramarathons. Keeping her results absolutely average for non professionals, through the years she managed to run some of the most prestigious ultrarunning competitions ever, until one day she manages, finally, to win the lottery for the most prestigious of all: Western States Endurance Run.And so she runs...But what happens when our beloved Speedsters helps her out and makes a playlist for her to listen during the race with one particular song that messes up with her memories and the not so buried heartache?
Relationships: Diana (Wonder Woman)/Steve Trevor
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	Supernova

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shipsnthenight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shipsnthenight/gifts).



> Inspired both by the eponymous song by Within Temptation, a personal headcanon that Diana is a runner (don't ask me why) and what happened to ME when I listened to this song for the first time actually listening to the lyrics. I was running. It was worse than getting a cramp in my quad.  
> AND CRAMPING QUADS ARE BAD

Being born and raised in a society that promoted athleticism, Diana Prince was baffled at the idea of  _ fitness _ that Man’s World had, mostly regarding women. More like the lack of the concept itself, since except a few specific categories of people, physical exercise wasn’t encouraged at all. There wasn’t much she could do to keep herself fit and in top shape, at least in public, but she found ways. She had to find secluded places where she could exercise the way she wanted, anytime she wanted, but it was lonely and boring. 

Those years spent training alone were a drag, after some time, around the mid fifties, she found herself loathing exercising, something that had never happened in her long, long life. Until...

She got lucky some decades after she sailed away from Themyscira, when in the late sixties the  _ running craze _ hit the world. People started jogging for health reasons, some were trying to emulate the long distance runners they saw on TV during the Olympic Games, others just because they needed an energy release after being cooped up in an office all day long. 

Needless to say, she took that train and never stepped off it. Through the decades, she saw the sport develop and the amateur crowd get bigger and bigger, to the point that some races got so crowded they had to introduce lotteries and strict qualifying times just to apply to said lotteries. She saw the technology of the gear get better and better each year, world records being smashed, to the point that one man nearly went sub-2 on the Marathon distance. That meant running 42,6 kilometers or 26,2 miles in less than two hours, a herculean effort, for the normal human being. 

Not for her. She could easily win every race she ran and claim every world record in every distance, but she didn’t care. What she liked about running, was the alone time. Alone, but not lonely. Every time she went for a run, she would encounter at least three other runners on her path, and even if the crowds spreaded a lot during races, it was nearly impossible to be alone on the road, most of all if she kept her pace at a middle-of-the-pack speed. She found people to chat with, exchange some words of encouragement and see them pick up their speed and run ahead of her to chase a better time, a personal record or just running away from their ghosts. 

Because she did a lot of that too. Ghosts of places she had left behind, of wrong decisions, of mistakes she had made… people she loved.

So she ran. She made sure not to stand out in the crowd, to keep her pace at a reasonable speed for her age group, and she ran ever race she could get into. Through the years she had ran the six major marathons around the world, Tokyo, London, Berlin, Boston, New York and Chicago, every year she attended the Paris marathon, since she lived there. She had ran in Roma, Venezia, Los Angeles, Big Sur… pretty much every marathon she could get to. But as time went by, she set her eyes on other longer challenges: the ultramarathons.

An ultramarathon was a race that ran over the distance of a marathon. There were 50 kilometer races, 100 kilometer, 100 miles and everything in between and beyond. Most if not all of them were not road races, they were held in the mountains, on trails, and that was another aspect of ultrarunning that appealed to her: getting away from the city, the civilization and the concrete, to breathe fresh air and pound softer terrain other than the hard pavement. 

So around the early nineties, she moved some if not most of her racing to ultrarunning. She started with 50k and 50 milers, then upped the distances with longer and longer races, until she qualified for the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc and later the Ultra Trail Of Mount Fuji, The Spine Race in England, and those were just a few races she did before she set her eyes in the USA ultrarunning scene, running a lot of races on the other side of the pond, so to speak.

Running on such distances required some additional strategy, because despite her divine heritage and top notch fitness, she got hungry when she ran for so long. Being on the trail for sixteen to twenty four hours at a time, if not more, meant burning an insane amount of energy, that needed to be replenished. Most ultrarunners raced with a crew, people that followed the course with a car and provided everything the runner needed, from water to food to additional gear, catering to any needs of the athlete. 

She had no crew. She ran alone. She could only count on dropboxes she would prepare before the race and she would access at specific aid stations during the race. She needed to be careful about what she packed, keeping a careful eye to the weather to see if she needed to add clothing and spare pairs of shoes, what kind of food and liquids she would need… she didn’t really want to find herself without water in the middle of a race with no aid station in sight.

That additional component got her even more into that kind of race. It was the closest thing to Antiope’s running training back on the island, when she would make everyone run around the mountain paths away from the towns for hours, with their armors and full weapon set on them, just for the sake of fitness. Of course she couldn’t run the course in her armor and full gear, but the weight of the vest on her back, with the bladder full of water and the pockets filled with food and other necessities to take her from one aid station to the other reminded her a bit of the weight of her shield, making her feel closer to her shieldsisters back at home. 

There was one race though, the Super Bowl of ultrarunning the called it. Western States Endurance Run, a 100 miler held in California each year in June, the one race she hadn’t managed to get in yet. She qualified, but there were so many people trying to get in and so little spots, it took her nearly ten years get in. She managed to squeeze herself in the 2019 race, finally!

After that, she could apply for the Barkley Marathons, but she didn’t really want to steal the glory of being the first woman to complete that insane race, someone else deserved that honor, not a metahuman in disguise that could easily complete it with just some food, water and some effort. 

So when the race came, she packed her gear, flew to California and with Barry as her lonely crewman to handle her needs she set herself to finally run Western States.

The night before, in the hotel room near the Squaw Valley ski resort where the race started, they were going through the strategy while eating dinner. 

“So let’s revise the plan, so I can memorize it better,” proposed Barry, before biting into the huge pizza slice he had in one hand. In the other, he held a sheet of paper with the list of aid stations.

“Sure. I’ll see you at Robinson Flat, Michigan Bluff and Pointed Rocks. From both Michigan Bluff and Pointed Rocks you have the chance to run with me as a pacer, if you want. I will need you to bring me food and water. The weather should be fine but keep in the backpack that bag there,” she pointed at a white bag in the corner of the room, with her bib number printed on. “I’ll probably change shoes and socks somewhere after mile 80 but just in case keep the spare with you when we meet.” 

“Sure Diana. About nutrition you want bananas, not too ripe not too unripe and at least two PBJs at each station, right?” She nodded “Also you want at least two pints of electrolytes, two caps of lemon lime flavor tablets each pint, as cold as they can be, at the ready. While you eat I’ll refill the camelback and the flasks and take care of replenishing your vest with your gels. I have the packets with your picks ready so I know what to put at each station. Also, I’ll make sure to recharge the earbuds so you can listen to music around the clock. There’s a spare pair of wireless in the vest and a wired pair with the adapter too. And a power bank to keep your phone running all the time. The watch battery should last to the end of the race, but there’s the plug for that too, and the power bank has two USB plugs so you can charge the two at the same time.” He was referring to her GPS watch she used to track her run and visualize the course map without needing the phone or carry a map. “Gosh Diana, you always done this alone before?” 

“Yeah, it’s not like I can ask many people to come and help me. Or that I need that much help, really.” 

“But we’ve known each other for two years now! How many of these races have you ran last year?” 

“Six…” she sighed. “But four were in Europe.” 

“Well it doesn’t take me much to run to anywhere in Europe!” he chuckled. “And I know you don’t need much help, being… well, being Wonder Woman, but I would have loved to bring some support! It must be nice to have someone waiting for you at the finish line.” 

She shrugged her shoulders. “I have no idea, I’ve always done this by myself, usually it’s other runners and their crews that cheer for me. I’ll see tomorrow how it is.” 

He took a deep breath. “Now that I think of it, why do you do that? I mean, you’re not even shooting for the podium, you aim for an under 20 hour finish, I’ve checked the statistics that’s kind of lame in my opinion! You could be a star!” 

“I’m metahuman, Barry. It’s like doping without actually doping. I have an unfair advantage. The middle of the pack works just as good for me. As for why I do this… it started because it felt nice to exercise with other people for once and continued just because I like it. The longer I go, the better I feel. You can say that I run away from my problems, in a way.” 

“Anything in particular?” 

Smiling, she nodded. He knew what problems she was running away from. “Yes, sometimes I run away from Steve.” 

Barry shook his head. “Why am I not surprised?” Then he grabbed another slice of pizza and shoved it in her hands. “Eat, come on, you need to carboload before such a race!”

“And when the hell did you learn about the concept of carboloading?” 

“I may or may have not studied this thing of ultrarunning in the past couple of weeks, who knows?” 

* * *

The race started at 5 AM, as usual. The runners gathered at the starting line about an hour before they were given the go. The first ten or so miles were pretty packed, with the elites already far ahead of the main group, the midpackers, and the first two aid stations were crowded. She barely passed through them, stopping only the minimum time necessary to refill her water flask and get on the trail again as soon as she could. Not that she was behind her schedule, but she wanted to keep going in order to distance herself from other runners and have room to move without having to constantly pass other runners. Usually she wouldn’t mind some company, but for some reason that day she felt like she needed to be alone. 

It was one of those days. 

One of those days when she felt like the most introvert in the world, a moment she needed to spend with herself and her thoughts, to mull over things that had happened to her in her past, maybe analyze recent events she had participated in as Wonder Woman to maybe find better strategies for future reference. 

Or maybe it was one of those days where she got lost in the few memories she had of Steve and got herself wrapped up in the little happiness they had shared together before he… before he died. 

One of the reasons she had picked up running as her  _ sport of choice _ , as she called it when replying to questions such as  _ how do you stay in shape _ , was because of him. As they had sailed to London on the boat, they had little to past the time so they talked a lot and one of their major subjects to discuss was their upbringing. She would tell him about her training as an Amazon warrior and he would tell her about his parents' ranch in the Midwest of the United States, his homeland, the things he did as a child and at some point he revealed he would do cross country running when he was in school, and that he absolutely loved it. He was one of the few people in boot camp that actually performed well in running drills, when he first got in the army. Even when he switched to aviation and moved to England to help with the war efforts, he would go out running almost every morning, when his missions allowed it. 

It was a tiny detail about his life among the many they had shared while they were together that had stuck with her, more than others, maybe because it was something they both did, unlike most of the other aspects of their lives. The cultural differences between them were stark enough to ensure they should have bickered non-stop when they were awake and in each other presence, but it was the similarities, no matter how few and tiny, that allowed them to bond, first as warriors, then as friends, and then as lovers. 

She sighed, as the first aid station where she would see Barry appeared in her line of sight. She accelerated a little bit and crossed the blowup arch, pausing for a second beneath it to make sure the timing chip registered her passage, then headed through the station, looking for Barry. She was handed a banana by a smiling volunteer that also patted her back and wished her a good race from there on. Diana thanked her and finally managed to locate him, thanks to the bright red Flash t-shirt he was wearing, and jogged to him.

“Do you really need to wear that thing?” She wasn’t exactly happy with their merchandising, even though Bruce said it aided a lot with the money issues the League would encounter. His capitalist mind never stopped racing, even if it meant cashing in from selling merch related to the League. 

“I stand out!” he replied, opening her folding chair so she could sit down and shoving a huge pint glass of electrolytes in her free hand as she sat. The moment her butt touched the canvas, she realized the banana was now peeled in her hand and Barry had a smug smile printed on his face. 

“Do you realize that if we’re caught for who we are I’m getting disqualified and I’ll never see that damn buckle in my life again?” 

“Yeah, I know, but I’ve seen at least six other people with t-shirts like mine or related. And sure as hell the skinny guy wearing a Superman tee wasn’t Clark. Now drink, I’ll take care of the pack. Need anything specific?” 

“No, just what we have planned!” she told him while munching on the banana. She was starving. And her throat was parched. Heck it was a hot day! “Maybe a can of Coke?” she wondered aloud. “Do they have Sprite?” 

“I’ll take a look while I fill the waterpack. Be right back.” 

He walked towards the tables where the volunteers were handing out food, water and other essential and dumped the remaining water in the pack in the ground, since it was now at body temperature and more resembling soup than water, and while he filled it from a large cooler he looked around for the sweet drink she had asked. She was about halfway through the pint of her drink when he returned with a full waterpack and a can of Sprite. “Should I degas it?” 

Diana nodded. “Yes please.” She gulped the last of the electrolytes and handed him the plastic cup so he could dunk the can in it and degas it, for easier drink. Meanwhile, she grabbed one of the tinfoil wraps laying on the backpack beside the chair and attacked the first PBJ sandwich. “How am I doing?” she asked as she munched. 

“From what I gathered, you’re right behind the elites and about thirty minutes ahead of your time table. Sixty or close overall and 24th among the women.” 

“Not bad. I thought the course would be harder, but what’s tough is the heat. Damn!” 

“Well, it’s California, what were you expecting?” he asked her, crouching beside her to look straight at her. 

“I’ve ran here in California before, but today it’s hotter than the usual. Just that.” 

“Thank global warming.” 

“Yeah, I guess I should do that. I guess I should just run and get to the finish line fast, so I can get to a place where there’s air conditioning.” 

“Well, you’re currently heading upward, it should be colder up there. Maybe there will be some snow too, if you need to cool down.” 

“I’ll see about that.” She took another bite of the sandwich and chewed as fast as she could. “Come on, let me finish here so I can get on the trail again.” 

This time, when she left the aid station, she had music on. Being alone with her thoughts was nice, but after a while, the noise of her own steps on the dirt beneath her shoes became annoying, so before she left, about ten minutes after she had arrived, she grabbed the earbuds and blindly started a playlist Barry had made and downloaded on her Spotify account, mostly upbeat songs she didn’t know. She had asked him to surprise her with things she would never listen to on her own, and he had delivered. There was a ton of Japanese stuff he had tried to make her listen to for months now, and he finally got his chance, a lot of heavy metal - she had no idea Barry liked that type of music - and some electronic instrumental music too that she found herself getting lost into. It was really nice, the mix of different genres kept her concentrated on the trail just enough not to trip on every root or rock on the path, but distracted her just that tad she needed to avoid starting to mess up with her own thoughts and derail herself from her goal, which had happened in the past. 

She had even  _ bonked  _ once, for lack of a better term, during the Ultra Trail of Mont Blanc some years back, considering dropping out and DNF the race because of stray thoughts that got to her and made her feel unworthy of the glory of finishing such a hard - well, not much to her - and important race in the ultrarunning world. It had taken her nearly twenty minutes to talk herself out of the funk and start running again. 

At the next aid stations she kept the same timetable of refilling the water bottles, getting electrolytes and food in her system and leaving as soon as she could. Even when she met Barry, she never asked for her placing, feeling it would make her speed up solely out of pride, and she didn’t want that. 

Catching up with the elites would be seen as strange, from an unknown though accomplished amateour ultrarunner, she didn’t want to raise any attentions on herself and her hobby, attentions that would have probably forced her to undergo a doping test. A test that would have found clear biological markers that made her stand out - a lot - from the common human woman and probably oust her as Wonder Woman, and not simply as Diana Prince. 

As the hours passed and she reached a point when she had more miles behind her back than those in front of her, she relaxed a little bit and allowed herself to get lost in the music a little bit, listening more closely to the lyrics of the songs she was listening to, a nice distraction from the slight ache in her left calf. Nothing to worry about, it was probably more a phantom ache - she would get them sometimes - that would go away by focusing on something else, but it was distracting nevertheless. 

But soon, just after the river crossing at Rucky Chucky at mile 78, the welcome distraction brought on by the music became a sudden source of sorrow and anguish. She had decided to proceed without Barry as a pacer for now, so she was alone, all on her own on the trail. As the sun was setting, basking the scenery around her in its beautiful orange and pink light, she was ascending a steep incline when a song with a heavy synth intro started. She was fishing in one of the many pockets of her vest to grab a gel when the song started and it piqued her interest, so she started listening more closely to it as she picked up her pace after having slowed down a little bit to retrieve that small packet of nutrition she was looking for. 

Bad mistake.

The lyrics hit her like the literal punch in the face, and that all too familiar feeling constriction around her heart she had felt on that damn tarmac that night more than a hundred years ago came back. Each step she took in time with the beat of the song sent a wave of heartache ricocheting up her spine and into her head that clouded her brain until all her thoughts were about Steve.

_ Gods, why now?  _ She asked herself.  _ What the hell… _

A sudden burst of memories of those weeks in 1918 flooded her brain once again. It was strange, usually this kind of thing happened around November, when the anniversary of Steve’s death came, not in early June, and not when she was so concentrated on doing something else. Not while running at least!

_...I’m waiting for your last goodbye ‘cause I’m not over it… _

Her throat was constricted in a chokehold that made breathing way harder than it should have been in normal circumstances and she felt the familiar stinging of tears in her eyes as she kept running, faster and faster, as if to run away from the pain and the heartache of her past, only for everything to come crashing down on her like a wave on the beach. 

_...As long as I dream, it ain't over, over, I'll bring the chains of gravity... _

“Damn!” she mumbled as another set of memories flashed before her eyes, as vivid as they could be. The trail got steeper and she stumbled, once, twice and nearly fell on the gravely track. 

_...Oh, I long for your fire, yeah, I long for your fire…  _

Another, different and dearer memory came up, surfacing from the deepest of her heart. Their one and only night together, when they had bared their bodies and their hearts for one another to see, feel and love, the last night she had been completely been sincere with another human being, the last night of her innocence, so to speak. At that point, she was crying freely. Nobody was around her, no one could see her in the turmoil, no one was there to witness how easily the great Wonder Woman could crumble beneath the heavy burden of her past, of the trails of death she had left behind on her path, the trail of thick red blood of enemies, friends and lovers alike. And it all had started that night. 

_...My heart is lost between the stars…  _

The made her stop on the track right at the top of the ascent, breath short and doubled over, while the lyrics of the song echoed in her head. She screamed at the top of her lungs, at the deaf sun and the quiet forest around her. Drops of sweat slid down her face and her arms and fell on the ground and the minute noise they made sounded like a thunder to her ears, for a moment silencing the pain, only for it to come back with a vengeance. 

Hell, that song really spoke to her in ways nothing ever had.

“Why now?!” she cried out, to no one but herself. “Why now!” She squeezed her hands so tight that the gel packet, still clasped between her fingers, exploded, leaving a sticky residue on her hand and her knee down her leg. 

Why now? Because she was so concentrated on a single goal she had looked at for years and her mind was vulnerable?

Or maybe it was because she was running? 

Because Steve loved running. 

And she still loved Steve, even after one hundred, seven months and twenty five days he had died, so much that sometimes she could see him in the corner of her vision, like a ghost, only for a moment before it disappeared as she tried to set her gaze on him. 

Only Hades knew how much she would give just to see him one more time, to hold his hand one last time, to tell him she loved him back. Just that, just one moment to tell him she loved him, back then and now still. She would give her immortality, just for that one moment. 

“ _ Malaka… _ ” she cursed in Greek. She briskly wiped the tears from her face and the sticky gel from her skin with a tissue paper she found in the backpack. “You’re going to be my ruin, Captain Steve Trevor… and you’re going to make me miss my estimated time!” 

Finally the song ended and another started, with lyrics of a completely opposite subject thank the Gods, and Diana felt a little more in control of herself. With one last sigh and one last look at the setting sun, she started running again. Still shaken, she felt a little unsteady on her feet for the first few miles, but by the time she reached the next aid station, she was back on track and on the timetable she had set for herself. Maybe a little ahead of it. 

But as her legs and feet regained the stability she needed to complete the course, the sudden burst of memories couldn’t be wiped away just like that. Many of them, mostly the sweetest ones, those she held closest to her heart, still came and went, like little bubbles. Some made her smile, other made her feel the longing for something she never actually had… but at least she could run. She could be hungry, she could be thirsty and in emotional turmoil, but at least she could run. 

It wasn’t much, but it was more than enough to reach her goal and get that damn 24 hours finisher buckle she had coveted for so many years. DNFing was not contemplated. Setting her mind on the final goal, she found some relief from the unwanted anguish and more focus than even before. 

At Pointed Rocks, the last aid station where she would meet Barry, there was quite a crowd when she jogged in. Again, a volunteer shoved a banana in one of her hands and a can of Coke in the other, forcing her to eat and drink them before the girl dragged Diana to the medical tent. “Just a quick check, we’re doing it to everyone that passes through!” said the paramedic. Silently, she took the pack off her back and sat on the folding chair in front of the guy. The paramedic checked the bracelet around her wrist, then asked a few quick questions to see if she was oriented and focused. “What’s your name?” 

“Diana Prince” 

“Where are you now?” 

“Pointed Rocks, second to last aid station of the Western States Endurance Run, 94 miles in.” 

The guy seemed impressed, as the volunteer behind him. “Someone here studied the course! One last thing: how old are you?” 

“Thirty two.” 

He nodded. “Alright, you’re good to go Diana. Come on, only six miles to go, you’re crushing it!” 

Smiling, she grabbed her pack and thanked the volunteers, before she set out to look for Barry among the many crews at the station. She found him close to the exit gate, wearing running gear. “You’re coming with me?” 

He nodded, vehemently. “Yeah, if you don’t mind.” 

“No, not at all!” At this point, she couldn’t really tell him not to come and wait for her at the finish line. She needed someone to share the last six miles with. 

She ate and she drank her fill, restored the water in her flasks and waterpack on her back and then waited for a moment - literally - for Barry to get all the supplies to the car, before the set out of the trail for the last six miles of the course. The last stretch. Some people described the last ten kilometers as the toughest of them all.

“Are you alright?” asked Barry, about half a mile in.

Diana was deeply engrossed in her thoughts and his voice startled her a bit. “Yeah, sure. Why do you ask?” 

“Because you’re too silent. Has something happened while I was waiting for you?” 

Smiling, she shook her head. “No, nothing happened. It’s just that sometimes when I’m alone some memories come back from the past with a vengeance.” 

“Ah yes, that happens to me too. That’s why I hate being alone. But at the same time I feel like I’m not good enough with people, so I’m alone most of the time.”

“Is that why you fill your days with animes and the loud music?” 

He smiled. “Yeah, you can say that. By the way, did you like it?” 

“Most of it. Just… next time, avoid songs that talk about dead people and how much people miss them, alright?” 

Barry frowned, slowed down for a moment and then seemed to realize what she was talking about. “I hadn’t thought about  _ Supernova _ !” he exclaimed. “I’m sorry Diana, I just liked it and thought you would have liked it too so I put it in the playlist… I’m sorry…” 

“Hey, I liked it. Just… don’t add songs like that to playlists I'm going to listen to when I’m out on a trail during a one hundred mile race!” 

He sighed. “I bet you’re never going to let me be your one man crew now…” He was truly sorry.

“I never said that and you were an amazing one man crew! Of course I’ll let you join me for the next race!”

“And what will it be?” 

“Ultra Trail Du Mont Blanc. I got in again after six years finally!”

“Then count me in!” he stated, fistbumping her in the middle of the road. “I’ve always wanted to travel more for leisure reasons. How’s that part of Europe?” 

Diana chuckled. “Some of the most beautiful mountains I’ve ever seen, and some of the most delicious dishes a human could have conceived.” 

“That’s it, I’m sold. I’m coming, crewing or not crewing.” 

“I had no doubts about that.” 

* * *

When they finally reached the paved road, they knew they were almost there. There was a crowd of people cheering on each side of the road, urging them on, into the high school track of the town of Auburn, for the last effort, the last few meters that separated her dream of competing - well, sort of - at the so called Super Bowl of ultrarunning would come true, and all the pain and the suffering, because despite her status of demigoddess she did suffer on the trail, mostly for the heat and the thirst, would be worth something. 

But there was something more than a foldable chair, a pint of beer and coveted belt buckle waiting for her. As they entered the stadium, she heard voice chanting her name, loud enough to drown the voice of the announcer over the loudspeaker. 

“What the…” She turned towards the direction the voices were coming from and saw Clark, Lois, Bruce, Arthur, Mera and a heavily covered Victor cheering from her right beside the finish line, spurring her on to get to the end of the race. Even Martha and Alfred were there, and the Batsons! Those kids were the loudest of them all, they even had made signs to cheer for her. 

“Barry, is that your doing?” she asked, in tears, as she pointed towards her friends. 

“Eh… I may have told Clark about your running thing and how you never had anyone cheering for you at the finish line early this morning…” he explained, sheepish. “But I didn’t ask them to come here! I think it’s his doing.” 

Shaking her head, she took the last turn on the track before the line. “One last sprint?” proposed Barry. “I’m tired of going so slow.”

“If you call a 7:30 minute per kilometer on that kind of trail slow, be my guest!”

They sprinted a little bit, just enough to make people see they were actually accelerating rather than slowing down. They crossed the finish line at 19 hours, 53 minutes and 17 seconds and from then on it was all sweaty hugs and big pats on her back from all her friends, who offered her big smiles and thunderous applauses. 

And it felt good. 

For the first time, having someone at the finish line to cheer on her and share the end of her efforts with felt great. Why hadn’t she asked them to come sooner, she had no idea. 

When someone of the organization came and put the finisher medal around her neck - the buckle would be awarded the next day - she almost felt like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. It felt awesome, to bask in the love her friends poured on her, no matter how sweaty and dirty and simply gross she was, with all the grime from the trail sticking to her clammy skin. It was like a drug she got instantly addicted to. 

And while she sat in one of the chairs provided to she could rest for a moment, enjoying a cold beer Arthur had fetched somewhere, she found herself drowning in her thoughts from before again.

The only missing piece from achieving pure bliss was having Steve there, to hug her and kiss her at the end of the trail. Or would have he run with her the whole way? Who knew… 

She just knew that sometime later, through glassy eyes, as she stared at the void in front of her and the voices of people around her became a droning sound she couldn’t distinguish anymore, she saw a figure, three or four meters ahead of her, that remarkably looked like Steve, only in modern clothing, hands in his pockets and a bright smile stamped on his face.

“You did good Diana…” She heard his voice, but the figure didn’t speak, just kept smiling at her from a distance. “Keep running even for me.” 

He turned around and started walking away from her, and before he pushed his way through the crowd of the finish line, she managed to blurt out the quickest “I love you!” she could muster.

The ghostly figure paused, turned to face her one more time and smiled again. “I love you too!”

She then felt a hand on her shoulder and startled on the chair, spilling some beer on her hand and the armrest beneath it. It was Clark. “Hey, you fell asleep! At least get out of those clothes before you crash!”

Diana looked around, slightly confused for a moment, before looking in the direction where Steve had been standing, and saw nothing. “Oh… Yeah, sure…” she barely managed to hide the disappointment of not finding him here with her. “I’ll…” She finished the beer in her hand and threw the empty plastic cup in the closest recycle bin. “I think I’ll head for the showers then. See you in a moment.” 

She left the trail vest with them and went to grab the last drop bag with her clean clothes. 

Was it a dream, or an hallucination? 

She had no idea, she just knew that despite not being over his untimely death, Steve would always be a part of her, always alive in her memories and her heart. And that way, he would never truly die. 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, ultrarunning is a thing, and yes, the Western States Endurance Run is the Super Bowl of ultrarunning, getting in is extremely difficult, thousands of applicants each year and only 300 (I think) slots available. Yes, there are people who run for 100 miles and sometimes more. There are ultratrail races that span multiple days. There's the Barkley Marathons that mixes both ultrarunning and orienteering and in more than thirty years only fifteen people have completed. Yes, it all exists, even carboloading. Look it up if you don't believe me. 
> 
> If you're curious about Western States Endurance Run, there are a number of documentaries you can watch on YouTube, I'm partial to Crewing States by The Ginger Runner and LIFE IN A DAY | The Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run by Billy Yang Films. 
> 
> As for the song mentioned, yes, I was out running the first time I listened closely to the lyrics of Supernova by Within Temptation (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3nb_r18ug0) and it hit me hard. Only I was out on a 7 km run because I had just started running a few months prior (this happened in February 2019, a few days after the album Resist was released) and yeah... it sucked. Anyway... Hope you liked the result of such emotional pain. Within Temptation tend to cause me huge feels, this is not the first time *cough cough* listen to Memories too *cough cough*  
> I had to take this plot bunny out of my head because it has been sitting in my head for nearly a year now and it was interfeering with Quantum. So yeah... hope you liked this one. I'll be back working on Quantum full time now. 
> 
> I gift this fic to my dear friend Shipsnthenight because she's always there to listen to my ramblings and never tells me to shut up even when she should. Love ya!


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